Shomei Tomatsu

Photographs 1951-2000

Ed. by Roland Angst. The Japanese photographer Shomei Tomatsu died December 14th, 2012, at the age of 82. The book collects 100 photographs representing the photographer’s career. Tomatsu’s photographs exist as evidence of his mixed feelings on encountering a post-war Japan, a country radically changed and deeply traumatized by its experiences during and after the Second World War. Speaking of his photographs he once said “the culture shock of defeat is my archetypal image.” Tomatsu made his reputation with a pioneering style of photography that rebelled against the more rigid formalistic style of photography that had existed in Japan previous to the war.